Board of Directors

PASS Board of Directors

The all-volunteer PASS Board of Directors is comprised of a four-member Executive Committee, Directors-at-Large, Founding Partner representatives, and appointed advisers. The Board engages data professionals throughout the world who use the Microsoft data platform - as well as Microsoft executives, product teams, and developers - to help develop quality programs, educational content, and speakers for the global PASS community. The PASS Board is elected by PASS members and acts in accordance with the PASS Bylaws.

Grant Fritchey

PASS President

Meet Grant Fritchey

Grant Fritchey joined the PASS Board in 2015. He is a SQL Server MVP with over 20 years of experience in IT and a product evangelist at Red Gate Software. A passionate and engaged member of the PASS community since 2005, Grant helped start the Southern New England SQL Server User Group and served as its president for four years. He has also served as editor of the PASS SQL Standard magazine and worked on committees dedicated to reviewing books. A frequent PASS Summit speaker, he has volunteered on the PASS Summit Program Committee, acted as a PASS Summit Ambassador, and participated as a mentor with the PASS Summit First-Timers program. Grant has written books for Apress and Simple-Talk and has worked with SQL Server since 1995. He has also developed in VB, VB.NET, C#, and Java. You can read Grant’s blog and follow him on Twitter at @GFritchey.

Wendy Pastrick

Executive Vice President, Finance & Governance

Meet Wendy Pastrick

Wendy Pastrick joined the PASS Board in 2013, serving as a Director-at-Large over User Groups, Virtual User Groups, and Educational Content. She has worked as a Database Administrator since 2000, supporting both development and production environments. Her many years of involvement with PASS include working with the Women in Technology Virtual Group and the Chicago Suburban User Group, serving as Regional Mentor for the Midwest region, and serving on both the 2011 Election Review Committee and the 2012 PASS Summit Program Committee. Wendy has organized many highly successful PASS SQLSaturday events in Chicago and has spoken at numerous others around the country. She received PASS' highest honor, the PASSion Award, in 2010.

Tim Ford

Vice President, Marketing

Meet Tim Ford

Tim is the Founder and CEO of TechOutbound, which produces personalized training events in exotic locations, including the successful SQL Cruise. Having over 25 years of experience in the Microsoft Data Platform, he's currently a Senior DBA/DBE for SurveyMonkey - focusing on cloud strategy, operations, and architecture for their SQL Server footprint. Tim previously architected, implemented, and supported the SQL Server environment from the ground up in a major Midwestern healthcare system and served in a senior role within that association for over 16 years. As a technical author, Tim has a passion for reaching audiences that start their journey in data by targeting entry-level topics or by writing for SQLMag.com, MSSQLTips.com, SQLServerCentral, Simple-Talk.com, and theSQLAgentman.com. He is the co-author of a book on Dynamic Management Objects with Louis Davidson and creator of The Periodic Table of Dynamic Management Objects. Tim presents on technical and professional development topics at many events, including PASS SQLSaturday, PASS Summit, SQL Cruise, and Local Group meetings.

Adam Jorgensen

Immediate Past President

Meet Adam Jorgensen

Adam is a SQL Server MVP and the President of Pragmatic Works consulting. He has been leading innovative SQL Server and Business Intelligence organizations for over a decade, and his passion is finding creative avenues for clients and the community to embrace innovation and lower barriers to implementation. Adam holds MBAs in Finance and Strategy, and he has authored a variety of articles and books on SQL Server, SharePoint, and analytics. Adam’s previous PASS involvement includes serving as a PASS Regional Mentor, as a member of the Regional Mentor Committee, and as co-chair of the PASS BI Virtual Chapter. Adam blogs regularly at adamjorgensen.com. You can also follow him on Twitter at @wadamj.

Allen White

Director-at-Large

Meet Allen White

Allen is the Business Development Manager for SentryOne. He's been both a developer and an administrator, so understands both perspectives towards database technology, and loves sharing his experiences and helping people learn how to use SQL Server. Allen has spent over 40 years in IT, has been using SQL Server since 1992, and is certified MCITP in SQL Server and MCT. Allen has been awarded Microsoft’s MVP Award for the last nine years.

John Martin

Director-at-Large

Meet John Martin

John Martin has been involved with the SQL Server and Data Platform community for over a decade now, having started off as an attendee at the UK SQL Server User Group all those years ago. Progressing from attendee, to helper, to speaker, and organizer over time. John has a strong belief that PASS and the Data Platform community can aid members in being at the forefront of the industry as it evolves with new technologies and processes. John believes vehemently in equality of opportunity and that discrimination in any form has no place in PASS, the Data Platform community, and our lives in general.

In work, John is currently a Product Manager for SentryOne, having started out in the IT industry by accident back in 2004 and working his way to becoming a DBA. Since then John has had the opportunity to work in several roles that have given him a broad view of Data Platform technologies, along the way spending time as a PFE with Microsoft based in the UK.

As a member of the PASS Board of Directors John will be looking to speak with and get feedback from many areas of the Data Platform community. The goal being to help deliver the most value to the members of PASS and help them achieve their goals.

Eduardo Castro

Director-at-Large

Meet Eduardo Castro

Eduardo Castro, PhD, began a two-year term on the PASS Board of Directors on January 1, 2017. Eduardo has been the PASS Regional Mentor for LATAM since 2014 and organized the first SQLSaturday in Latin America in Costa Rica. Eduardo previously served as a Board Advisor, LATAM, from 2015-16 and has worked in the IT industry for more than 18 years, focused on Microsoft Technologies.

Chris Yates

Director-at-Large

Meet Chris Yates

Chris Yates has dedicated himself for the last 17 years to IT and currently works for a financial institution in the state of KY. He has been a highly passionate and engaged PASS member since the year 2011 in which he attended his first PASS Summit. Today you will find Chris helping co-lead the Louisville SQL and Power BI user group along with co-organizing the Louisville SQL Saturday event. Having attended multiple PASS Summit’s, he realizes the importance of leadership within the community and is extremely passionate about helping others succeed. He is also a past PASS blogger, author, speaker, personal blogger, and mentor. You can find Chris’s blog or follow him on Twitter at @YatesSQL.

Chris Woodruff

Director-at-Large

Meet Chris Woodruff

Chris Woodruff (also known as Woody) brings over 20 years of experience in developing and architecting solutions, making him very knowledgeable in understanding our ever-growing technical community. As a community leader, his involvement with events like CodeMash and GiveCamp make him a valuable asset to the Community Development portfolio. Furthermore, his experience as a speaker and podcaster cover topics like database design and open source. He has been a Microsoft MVP in Visual C#, Data Platform, SQL and was even recognized in 2010 as one of the top 20 MVPs worldwide. Woody owns and leads Woodruff Solutions LLC to provide solutions involving mobile apps and the services that drive mobile solutions.

Diego Nogare

Director-at-Large

Meet Diego Nogare

Diego Nogare’s educational background is an initial degree in Computer Science, followed by a post-graduate degree in Computer Engineering with an emphasis on web development using .Net. Since completing his studies, he has authored four books in Portuguese: "Do Banco de Dados Relacional à Tomada de Decisão", "SQL Server Além do Conceito: Blog Post Collection", "SQL Server Além do Conceito: Volume 2" and "Análise Preditiva com Azure Machine Learning e R". In addition to this, he is also a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional [MVP] in Data Platforming since 2008, and in 2017, was presented with the same award in the Artificial Intelligence category. In terms of his work for PASS, Diego has served as a regional mentor between 2014 and 2015, led a PASS local group in São Paulo, and acted as the regional board advisor for the LATAM area between 2015 to 2016. Now, Diego focuses on speaking at Microsoft and PASS events, his work as a director with PASS, and provides updates on his work through his blog: www.diegonogare.net

Joe Sack

Meet Joe Sack

Joe Sack is a Principal Program Manager at Microsoft, focusing on Query Processing for Azure SQL Database and SQL Server. He has worked as a SQL Server professional since 1997 and has supported and developed for SQL Server environments in financial services, IT consulting, manufacturing, retail, and the real estate industry. Joe’s Twitter handle is @JoeSackMSFT and you can find him speaking at most major SQL Server conferences.